Monday, 16 December 2013

Hobblin' to the Hobgoblin.

Staines be very ashamed of yourself – I went to The Hobgoblin
on a cold and wet December Saturday night but that’s no excuse; the place wasn’t
full and it should have been.

By the end of an evening where the only thing to worry about
was my ‘Ian Dury’ style walking stick, the Bouncers only had themselves to
throw out.

If you were one of those discerning patrons who were there, you
were lucky enough to get not one band but a double bill; all fired up and full
of fight.

MOD night? Maybe not
exactly.

MOD attitude? Definitely.

If you drew a triangle from Camberly to Woking and then down
to Staines you would catch most of the bands that make up our local MOD scene
and a revival that’s been just great for me.

That said neither Redeye nor The Sha La La’s from Woking are
covers bands or pretending to be something they aren’t.

the

Sha la la’s

First up we had a Hammond Organ as a special treat for me (did
they know I was coming?), good solid Drums
and Bass and a high powered Lead guitar and vocals;

This is from a recent article in ‘The Woking News and Mail’;

Woking
four-piece The Sha La La’s have finally got round to playing the music they
love, and it turns out so do loads of other music fans.

Frontman
Darron Robinson said; “All of us have been in other bands, I’ve been in loads,”
he says. “But now I’m finally doing what I’ve always loved….. I thought ‘Sod
it, I’m going to make the music I want to play’…..So, he wrote a bunch of songs
in a style that he calls ‘Motown punk’.

“It’s the
soul music that I love but with that energy and urgency of white working class
people,” says Darron. “It’s part of what I think of as a mod tradition, of
British working class kids that love American soul music.

“It’s a
tough mix. Even The Small Faces couldn’t quite pull it off but they came up
with something equally as good. Anyway, it’s not going to stop me having a go.”

The switch
in style has definitely worked for the band which features drummer John ‘Pax’
Piccirillo, guitarist Louis Lucano, and John Lee on Hammond organ, as well as
Darron who plays bass and sings (and is a full-time dad and part-time
decorator” at other times).

“The whole
thing took me by surprise,” he says. “We did a video for Something I Can’t See
and put it on YouTube and it went mad. We started getting gigs without trying

The Sha La
La’s then recorded an EP with (Keep On) Risin’ Up To Love as the main track,
and did a limited run of 2,000, which quickly sold out.

“Then
Detour Records contacted us to say they wanted some EPs to sell,” says Darron.
“We said ‘There’s none left’, so they said ‘We’d like to release an album by
you’.”

The result
is Feelin’ Real, which shows off Darron’s musical passion to perfection. “I
just love music,” he says. “When I listen to music I get the biggest thrill out
of it. I can’t listen to music without it inspiring me to do something.

“When I was
14 I started getting into stuff on the Stax label and people like Otis Redding
and Curtis Mayfield and at that time people like Dexy’s Midnight Runners and
The Jam were around.

“Back then
I didn’t know what to do with it. I couldn’t dance – still can’t – but it made
me feel so fantastic that I knew I had to do something. So I started making
music and it’s still the greatest thing to me.

Hard, fast and furious - I wonder why I liked it?

It was a great hour and I wouldn’t have minded if they hadn’t
stopped. It was Motown with fuel injection and a cylinder of nitrous oxide from “ somewhere
between Detroit and Canvey island”.

Then there was;

redeye

What was that all about?

According to their webpage it was; ‘aggressive MOD’….’a Punk twang’. Mmmmmh I think that's me.

Add to that Ollie Foord, exploding with rage and anger every so often –
almost as angry as I used to be (and that was at least two days ago).

That was fun, really it was. Arm windmilling around like Pete Townsend;

This is from the band’s webpage;

Jez Dubery
on Vocals

Ollie Foord
on Vocals and Guitar

Mark Clancy
on Bass

Chris
Prendergast on Drums

Although
Redeye as a name goes right back to 1999….it started with Ollie Foord & Jez
Dubery playing original material that Ollie had written around each other's houses
starting around mid 2010….They met through other friends of theirs at the time
then the set the sound and aggression got bigger……The sound of Redeye is that
of power and guts with lyrics about real life, politics with a punk twang to
some lines, but sound wise very indie rock, Motown, Ska and especially
aggressive Mod all rolled in to one depending on the song influenced down to
the sharp image they have.